Black Chew Head, Greater Manchester

1st May 2019

Milk Hill, Wiltshire

29th April 2019

Milk Hill was a bit of a disappointment really, as there was nothing to signify the top of the hill (or at least that we could find!) We ended up having to just wander around a field until our GPS said we’d hit the highest spot, which was right in the middle of a field!

Much like Oxfordshire, it was blowing a gale at Milk Hill and at one point it actually made it hard to stand up!! Wearing a hat was perhaps not the best choice of the day, but my ears hurt too much not to. The views from the walk up to the top were well worth it though 🙂

White Horse Hill, Oxfordshire

Walking to the highest point of Oxfordshire while there was a crazy storm blowing was perhaps not the normal way to spend a Saturday! At the top is was impossible to hear each other and almost impossible to keep upright!

We walked up to the ‘viewing spot’ to see the White Horse, but it was a bit of a disappointment to say to least! The angle of the hill makes it actually impossible to view the horse from up close 🙁

Walbury Hill, Berkshire

24th April 2019

The first stop on our Berkshire/Hampshire day out, we parked at the car park towards to the top of Gallows Down and though we could see the top of Walbury Hill from the car. We walked towards the radio antenna thinking it was the top, then after checking the map again we realised we’d gone the wrong way ?‍♂️

After turning back and heading in the opposite direction from the car we followed the byway for a while before coming across a gate in to a field that lead to the trig point for Walbury Hill. The field had lambs in so we were careful to not disturb them too much, and after a couple of photos to prove we’d been there it was back to the car to go to neighbouring Pilot Hill.

Pilot Hill, Hampshire

Part 2 of our Hampshire/Berkshire day, Pilot Hill was another short walk mainly due to Leah being on-call at work so we didn’t want to be too far from the car. The trig point for Pilot Hill is located slap bang in the middle of a farmers field, much like Walbury Hill was.

After taking the bridleway up a driveway to a (very nice!) house we hoped over the gate and walked through a small wooded area and on to a field. We kept to the boundary of this field and after passing through another small wooded area that didn’t seem to show on our OS map we turned SE and headed across the field until the trig point came in to view.

Lewesdon Hill, Dorset

Lewesdon Hill was a strange walk, the hill itself is actually National Trust owned land however finding somewhere to park to be able to make the walk took longer than I’d expected! In the end I parked outside a school on the crosshatch (it was a Sunday and everyone else in the village appeared to park there!) as there was just nowhere at all to park.

Once on the walk I got lost a few times even with following the markers across the fields. It wasn’t very clear where the footpaths went, so being polite to the farmers I stuck to the edge of the fields until seeing on the last field that there was a worn path across the middle. There are a few gates to be negotiated and it looked like there could often be cows in some of the fields. Once on to the National Trust land its quite an easy however somewhat steep walk to the top of the hill.

I took the same path back as I did up, however there are footpaths around that you could make a circular route from.

Leith Hill, Surrey

Leith Hill in Surrey was the best walk I’d been on for a while. It is clearly a spot popular with bikers and packs of tourists as in the Tower lies a tea shop where we could pick up a hot pasty ?

We stopped off at Leith Hill on the way to Gatwick Airport hoping that it would kill an hour or two. Turns out that its a very short walk and only took us about 10 mins to get to the top. Its hard to know exactly where the highest part was, but we’re pretty sure we got to it. The Tower is owned by the National Trust and for a small fee you can walk to the top of it to see the views.

Dunkery Beacon, Somerset

Dunkery Beacon was the first on my list seeing as it’s right on my doorstep and a fairly easy walk to start the year. It was also the testing ground for my new Meindl walking boots and Fjallraven trousers, both of which have proved to be great buys! I had originally purchased some North Face boots however they just didn’t feel right when I’d tried them on.

The walk up to Dunkery Beacon is a fairly easy one, starting at the gate/bridge and following the stream uphill until you come across another path which leads straight to the Beacon. Once at the Beacon there are a variety of paths you can take that will lead back to the road and ultimately back to the car. It was an early start and I was pretty hungry so I chose to do only a short walk, trying to get to 5km. There are plenty of footpaths in the area that you can easily extend the walk with.